The end of an era, and the beginning of something new

To everything, there is a season.

♥

Breaking up is hard to do...  It's not you, it's me...

Oh, friends. I can't even tell you how many times I've written this blog post. I've saved drafts and deleted them, I've written lengthy explanations and brief little farewell posts.

I even wrote a really long post that I planned to publish yesterday, but here I am re-writing it one more time.

I have talked about moving away from blogging for a few years now – closing up shop, no more PaperTurtle, trading morning blogging for morning yoga… I’ve mentioned it in conversation to my friends and family only to have them scoff, “I’ll believe it when I see it” – probably because I’ve threatened to do it so many times.

I published my first blog post in November 2008. Since then I have published 1,513 posts that have included sewing projects, baking cupcakes, growing sunflowers, raising turtles, losing my mom, drawing mandalas, teaching yoga and remodeling houses. For eight years I have shared our day-to-day life, weekend recaps, stories about my past, contemplating human nature, being vulnerable and speaking from my heart. For eight years I have been finding my own voice, making new friends, being inspired and inspiring others. And for eight years I have been photographing and writing about it all.

I believe that the success of a blog depends solely on the goals of the blogger. The success is directly tied to the outcomes the blogger hopes to realize. And since I never set out to "gain" anything from keeping this blog in the first place, the benefits have far exceeded anything I could have imagined to begin with. I just know that my focus has changed and there are other things I want to fill my time with and pay attention to.

When I think of the many ways PaperTurtle has served me, it feels like an immeasurable personal success! It really has been. And now it’s time for me to move in a new direction. I will still be writing, but not for this space. I will still be photographing, but also not for this space. Will I ever come back here? To PaperTurtle? Will I ever post more photos and/or stories? I don’t know. I doubt it, but stepping away from an eight-year-way-of-life is going to be strange. I won’t know until I try it.

In the meantime, you can “like” my yoga page on Facebook, MyYoga Friend Deb. I post quotes and links to articles/stories there and eventually, when my yoga blog is up and running, I’ll include links to my new blog posts there as well. I think I'll even come back here to PaperTurtle and post a link for my yoga blog when I'm ready to fly with that. For photos, you can follow my photos on Instagram. I’m PaperTurtle in that realm.

Sigh. So, yeah. That's that. I can hardly believe it myself. Maybe I won't fully believe it until I click that "publish" button and let this post fly. Just thinking about putting this out there gives me a sinking feeling in my belly. Silly as that sounds, I'm having a tough time wrapping my head around closing my beloved PaperTurtle blog. I think this will be a tough habit to break... There's also part of me that feels a little giddy and excited for being able to focus more of my attention on my mandala and yoga path.
 

I would like to express my very sincere appreciation to those who have followed my blog and have continued to read my words. I feel so much gratitude for everyone who has ever left a lovely comment to validate me, lift me, inspire me, bless me.

Looking back over the past eight years, PaperTurtle feels like such a great accomplishment and precious gift. I’m so very proud of what I’ve done here, and now I’m excited to do something new.

Onward and upward, my friends.
With so much love and gratitude,
♥ ~ Deb

This weekend in the land of yoga and turtles

Hey there, blog friends!

♥

Today is a special kind of Monday. It's the kind of Monday that begins a short work week. (I ♥ Good Friday!) And it's the kind of Monday where we get delivery of our new couch and also a pool table. (Woohoo!!!) And! It's the kind of Monday at the beginning of spring when we're breathing sighs of relief for two turtles that survived another winter hibernation. (Thank Heaven!). :o)!!!

I planted some sunflower seeds in the far corner of our backyard and they are rising to the occasion of spring. I want to plant a few more seeds to fill in the gaps because only a few are thriving. My hollyhock seeds didn't take well so I might try a few more of those as well.

I had yoga teacher training all weekend and there was more lecture than movement this time around. Really great stuff, though instead of sore muscles this morning I have an achy back. Ah, but that's nothing that some time on my mat after this blog post is written won't cure.

After teacher training yesterday afternoon, I did a little grocery shopping and came home to find Doug sitting out at our patio table. I joined him for a snack and a cold beer. Yes, yogis drink beer on warm Arizona afternoons. (Ok, and other times too...but especially on warm Arizona afternoons...)
 

See those sprinklers beyond the far edge of the table? There's green grass sprouting like crazy under them. It won't be long now until there's a lush lawn for Lucky to roll around on. Yay!

Perhaps our best news of the weekend is that both turtles welcomed the first day of spring with a stroll in the afternoon sunshine - such a relief for us fretting turtle parents! Rexy is still moving slowly, and Casper has a problem with her right eye. She'll be making a trip to the reptile vet this week to have it checked, but other than that all's well in turtle land. :o)

When we moved into our new house at the end of September last year we knew we wanted a larger couch for our living room. And we Doug removed a wall in the main living area to accommodate a future pool table. We are so excited that both of those items will be added to our home space today. Gosh, we're giving up lots of floor space today! It will take some getting used to for sure, but we're up for the challenge. I can't wait to come home from work tonight and play a game of pool with Doug, then plop myself down on our new couch for the season premier of "Dancing with the Stars."

Ooooh this is going to be a great Monday!

Hey - it already is!

Have a great week my friends.

♥

New house / new turtle land

Oh hey there, blog friends.

♥

Phew. I just could not get myself in gear yesterday morning and get to a weekend recap. Actually, myself was in gear finishing up the weekend's laundry and preparing for a new cleaning lady to come later in the day to take care of our floors while Doug replaced my car battery. How's that for a Monday morning? So, no official weekend recap on Monday morning but I'll sum it up in one word for you: busy.

When we moved to our new house (tomorrow will mark three weeks!) we used a large 55-gallon plastic tub to hold our two box turtles until we could build a new habitat for them. I filled the bottom with a bag of shredded bark and said a heartfelt prayer for their safety and well-being.

Well, everything was going fine(-ish) with the temporary quarters until our baby turtle, Casper went missing. Doug was working out of town for a few days and I hadn't see Casper at all, so when he came home he was given the potentially bad-news-task of digging in the bark to find a baby turtle.

The good news is that Doug found her and she was just fine. Bad news is that we discovered the reason she was so hunkered down was an attempt to hide from Rex, our male turtle who is seriously in the mood for love. L.O.V.E. And in such cramped quarters there was no escaping him without burrowing to the bottom.

 So Doug and I set aside some time this weekend to work on building a turtle pen. I had some ideas for the design and material to use, and Doug made it happen. Seriously, my husband is a jewel! He's so accommodating to my requests and worked so hard to make this happen. I love the new turtle pen AND my sweet and awesome hubby!!!

This little hut had been a bird house until we moved and I dropped it and the whole thing broke apart. I salvaged the top of it and thought it would be cute in the turtle pen...



I was right. ;o)









Rexy and Casper really like it too. It was fun to put them in their new space and watch them exploring it. This space has so much potential, and I can't wait to get some grass and other plants growing in there. We also need a few more areas for them to hide, and a better water source, but at least they are out of the plastic tub! And Casper has some space to move around and hide if/when she wants to.

In other pet news, Lucky the dog is a bit obsessed with being able to see and smell the turtles in his backyard. Now prayers are for this new habitat to keep the turtles in, and one very curious pup out.


♥

PS: Casper is about three years old. Female box turtles typically begin producing eggs when they are five years old and/or 5-7" in length. I'm glad that Rex is in love with her, and I hope he still feels the same in a couple of years when she's ready to reciprocate. ;o)

The new house and a long weekend recap

Hello, blog friends!

♥

Has it really been two weeks since I blogged? Oh wow - I am super glad I chose to take a little break on this space during our house move. I had last week off work and we have spent the past nine days...well...let me show you...

Whiskers Jay has lived in this house for six days now. As I type he is meowing in the hallway. Over and over and over. He's starting to settle in, for sure, but he is still very nervous about the new digs.

 

The floor tiling took waaaaaaaay longer than was originally anticipated. To the point that the tile guys were feverishly grouting as we were moving furniture in on Tuesday.

 

A house move is tough on pets...

My new craft and yoga space:

Our turtles went from living in turtle paradise to living in the projects. They seem to be doing ok - a bit hard to tell with turtles. We have some ideas for a new habitat for them, but at this writing I'm not sure when we will have time to make that happen.

It's shots like this next one that have me feeling grateful and super overwhelmed all at the same time:

At the end of every day we were absolutely spent. I don't even know how to begin to tell you how exhausting and exhilarating and hot and sweaty and tiring and joyful this past week was for us.

 

Fortunately, Doug seems to have ended the 9-day run (actually, 7 weeks for him) unscathed. As for me? Well...my right knee and ankle and heel = ouch. And. Oh my goodness. I woke up last Monday with shingles. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. O.U.C.H. So that has been a bit of an ordeal but I am coping!

 

This week. Sigh. This week...

My personal to-do list is super long, and I'm headed back to work this morning to face another kind of to-do list in the midst of the pull to want to be home continuing to settle into this new space. And that last sentence sums up the rambling pace of my mind right now. Ha!

This Friday marks the three-year anniversary of my mom's passing. Boo! :o( So many times over the course of the past nine days I thought of her and longed for her. I wanted to call and cry to her about the pain of shingles and the frustration of tile guys and the exhaustion of moving in this Arizona heat.

And this coming Saturday I'm leading a yoga/mandala workshop so there are kits to be made and a class to plan between now and Saturday afternoon. {lots of deep breathing...}

Even though I'd love to have a few more days off work, the thought of sitting in my office chair for a whole eight hours today sounds more appealing than I ever thought it would.

And with that I'm off to roll out my yoga mat and get back to a somewhat regular routine.

 

Have a great week, everyone!

See you next time...

♥

A weekend of yoga and turtles

It's Monday, and there's a hint of fall in the air.

Hooray!!! (for the fall part, not the Monday part...}

;o) ♥

And not that Monday is necessarily a bad thing, it's just that I could really use an extra day. But who couldn't?

I wish I had something to tell you other than my usual oh-my-gosh-what-a-busy-weekend, but it's just the way it is right now. I don't say busy like it's a bad thing - it's just that between yoga teacher training (all weekend) and our pending house remodel and move...well...let's just say that I'm having to really focus on living in the moment in order to maintain a sense of...well...not freaking out!!!

While the turtles are oblivious and happy out in their cozy habitat, Doug and I are running circles around here. I've purchase a really big plastic tub and a large bag of shredded bark that's used for reptile habitats to house them temporarily at our new place. Repeating in my head, "They'll be fine, Deb...they'll be fine..." They will.

It's 5:45 a.m. as I type this, and Doug has already left for the day. He's meeting roofers at the new house this morning to have a leak around the fireplace repaired. We're changing out all of the windows in the house to the more energy efficient dual-pane kind, and that happens tomorrow. Along with our electrician friend who will be there today or tomorrow to hang lights. Doug is going to be able to start painting walls this week, and French doors and floor tile will be installed next week. {And there you have the very condensed version of the new-house-to-do-list.}

As part of my current yoga teacher certification program, I attend a yoga teacher workshop one weekend a month and that happened this past weekend. It was a really great workshop with one of my favorite teachers, and my scribbly doodles in the photo above happened on day-three when my mind was so full of anatomy talk that I started to check out just a little. I'll have a post on Wednesday with a little more about this weekend's workshop. Loved it!!! ♥

 

This week along with my full-time-corporate-job, I'm teaching yoga three evenings after work. My heart is filled with so much gratitude for my yoga practice and the fact that I am finally able to share yoga with others through teaching. I'm praying for a shift in the near future that would allow me to follow that dream full time. In the meantime, I keep plugging along knowing that my super-full-plate won't always be this heaped-up-to-overflowing.

 

I have a house to move.

And there's a hint of fall in the air!!!

And a new week to grow in.

Wishing you all kinds of blessings this week,

and a reminder to breathe if your plate is full too.

xo

♥

This weekend on our piece of the planet

Hi everyone!

♥

I hope this weekend recap finds you well and happy. It was a deliciously busy weekend on our piece of the planet. Doug took a much needed break from the new house remodeling and headed north to camp with his brother, and I had my monthly yoga teacher training weekend - a total of 13 hours of anatomy lecture, yoga poses and yoga friends. I loved every minute!


Saturday morning I hit the ground running. I couldn't resist snapping a photo of the beautiful morning light streaming through our kitchen window - though the photo doesn't do that moment in time justice. I've packed most of our personal treasures in preparation for our upcoming house move, and it's actually been nice to not have so much clutter around. I'm thinking I may keep things to a minimum in the new house. Maybe.

A turtle story: Saturday morning I was rushing around here, admittedly with too many irons in the fire. I fed the turtles, started water for tea, put some eggs on to boil, got in the shower... About an hour later I came out to the kitchen to find our dog, Lucky, pacing around the kitchen table. Underneath the table was a big blob of something...was it a rock? What in the world... OMG - it was REXY! In my scurrying I had accidentally left the atrium door open, and our male box turtle wandered on inside and made his way to the kitchen table.

I picked him up and examined him for dog tooth marks but he was perfectly fine. So I held him down close to Lucky for a final dog sniffing and praising. What a good doggy!!! With our upcoming move we've been concerned about creating a new turtle habitat that was dog proof - just not knowing how Lucky would be with our shelled pets. We still wouldn't give Lucky free access to the turtles, but it's good to know his instinct for them is on the gentler side. Phew!

Saturday: Hurried housework in the morning, corralling a turtle, teaching yoga, learning yoga, practicing yoga, dinner with Carrie, and a visit to see her beau at his place of employment.

Sunday: Hurried housework in the morning, a 30-minute astrological phone reading from Debra Silverman (so cool!), lasagna soup made in the crockpot for dinner, more learning/practicing yoga, coming home to find Doug safely returned and Carrie here for lasagna soup, finished up laundry, enjoyed this sunset, fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

Now comes Monday, in her typical here-too-soon fashion, ushering out the final day of August. I have lots of cool things on my calendar this week with a three-day weekend on the horizon (yay!).

Here's wishing you the best possible outcomes for every little challenge you may face this week.

Remember, it's all about perspective...

♥

Just a Quote for Friday

{Thanks for the fun photo, Lin!}

"The world is so empty if one thinks only of mountains, rivers and cities; but to know someone who thinks and feels with us, and who, though distant, is close to us in spirit, this makes the earth for us an inhabited garden."

 

~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe